


Choices Seal Our Fate

by Frecklemore



Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout: New Vegas
Genre: Hinted past relationship, Other, Past Slavery, Scene Rewrite, Torture, kinda I guess?, suggested relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-15
Updated: 2017-10-15
Packaged: 2019-01-17 23:13:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,778
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12376119
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Frecklemore/pseuds/Frecklemore
Summary: It was just suppose to be a quick delivery to the Strip, but nothing is ever easy in the desert is it?





	Choices Seal Our Fate

**Author's Note:**

> I love the opening scene to new vegas but i had always wished there was a little more leading up to the scene of being shot, so this is how i pictured it with my courier!  
> This is also my first shot at fanfics! Let's see how it goes !!
> 
> Title from Broken Crown by Mumford & Sons

“He asked you a question, now answer it! Where is it?”  
The shot gun’s butt collided with a jaw in a swift movement, a sickening sound of teeth clashing together filled the still desert air.

The body, hunched over on the ground shook violently with every breath taken as they heaved heavily from their mouth. A deep inhale and they lift their head up to stare the Khans standing above them. A pathetic huff of laughter leaves their mouth and their tongue darts out to push out the blood starting to accumulate in their mouth from, what they’re guessing at this point, several missing teeth. 

“I ain’t got a clue what it is you particularly want, dolly. Sorry, don’t hav’ it.”  
The smug look on their face was wiped off with another hit to the head. 

“Alright alright, let’s let up there, fellas.” A new voice piped up. From behind the two Khan men, walked forward a man in a rather tacky checkered suit coat. “Let’s see if I can get our little mailman friend here to spill.” 

The courier turned their attention to the man and gave a weak cheesy smile as he approached. They did their best to fully sit up on their knees, and turned slightly to wave a hand, currently bound behind their back.  
“Benny, Benny. Come on, there’s a misunderstanding here! Why don’t you come on down and give me a hand with these ropes, let me go, and we can talk this through, eh?” The courier paused, looking up at the man in checker, Benny, before adding, “We’re friends, and friends don’t just lie to each other. If I say i don’t have it, I. Don’t. Have. It.” Each word was given special emphasis, the smile on their face now clearly a fake one. 

Benny looked down at the courier for a brief moment before sighing and shaking his head. He paced slowly in front of the crouched body, mumbling softly to himself before turning his gaze back onto them.  
“Guntor, I'd love nothing more to let ya go.” He chuckled, and the look that passed over his face could easily be described as one of someone who knew they had the winning hand, but the next flip of a card could be game over. “But you and I both know, you’ve got something that belongs to me.” 

“What, little ol’ me?” Guntor gasped in fake shock at the accusation. “Benny Boy, I am shocked! I would never take something from you!” They reeled back and still on their knees, balanced slightly on the balls of their feet. They had a slightly self satisfied look on their face, eyebrow cocked up. “Besides well, “ they paused to swipe their tongue across their front teeth, “If I had a clue as to what you were looking for, we both would know that it doesn’t belong to you.” They gave their tied up arms a shrug. “So is it really then stealing from you?” 

The man in checker popped his hands in his pocket, and responded with a shrug of his own before beginning to pace in front of Guntor. He turns his sights onto the rapidly setting sun upon the Mojave. It wouldn’t be long now before dark. Benny returned to Guntor who was staring back, expectantly.  
“Times running out, kid. I need the bag, where is it?” 

“What bag?” Almost immediately came the reply, false confusion in a mocking matter still on their face. At this point, he was being played with, and one thing you do not do to Benny is play him. He removed one hand from his pocket and gave a quick snap. From behind him, the two Khan’s stepped forward. He flicked his wrist vaguely in the courier’s direction and they quickly made their way towards the bound person. A flash of brief concern, and what Benny would probably call panic, went across Guntor’s face. They instantly tried to cover it up with a nervous smile, as the two Khan’s each grabbed one arm, lifting them up. Benny turned around to start walking away. They were only so many places in the nearby vicinity that the bag could be hidden. 

“Awh what’s wrong, Benny!” They called over the two men’s shoulders. “Casino life got you going soft?? Can’t do your own dirty work, you gotta hire these two slugs to do it for ya? Where’s the Tribal I knew who would just go straight for the gutting huh?” That stopped him. Guntor felt a flash of victory, as he turned back around to face them. He held a hand up and the two Khan’s paused as he walked up to be face to face. 

“Alri’ now I got your attention.” Guntor wrinkled up their nose in a slight sneer. “Benny, sweetie, How about you let me go,” Their voice, losing all taunting matter and sounding more sultry, “And we both forget about this whole ‘tying me up and holding me hostage’ thing. And maybe, if you see these boys of yours off, just maybe we can, settle this. One on one.” The last words, punctuated with a flirty smirk. “I promise, I have no tricks up my sleeve.”

Benny reached out and grabbed Guntor’s face, squishing their cheeks together and pushing their face back away from him. He gave another snap and the two men dropped the courier to the ground, to which they landed heavily and onto their side with a grunt of pain making an ‘oof’ sound. 

“Real cute, Kid. Not gonna work today.” He leaned down and gripped the back of the duster and shirt Guntor was wearing and pulling them down hard, choking the courier briefly. “Besides, we both know the only thing you have ‘up your sleeve’ works more in my favor.” He tapped a heavily scarred brand mark on their back near the base of their neck, with the back of his hand. The mark, even in the twilight, boldly stood out against the surprising pale skin, for the desert. At the touch, Benny could feel the body below him give a shiver.  
“So I think I know some very lovely folks who would love to see you back where you came from, but perhaps if, oh, I don’t know, you tell me where the bag is and, “ He paused, and replied in the same tone Guntor was using earlier, “We both forget about this whole thing.” 

He could hear the two Khan’s shuffle uncomfortably behind him. Sure it was a low blow, bringing up the courier’s previous slave status and threatening to return them, a fate worse than death, but right now the hidden package was more important.

Guntor’s steely olive eyes narrowed taking in the man in front of them. They rolled over did their best to get back up without the use of their hands and leaned forward as far as they could on their knees without tipping over from being distorted from the abuse they’ve been taking.  
“Fine, let’s say I do have what it is you’re looking for. That still doesn’t change the fact that it’s not for you.” Their lips turned up into a snarl, revealing the now completely blood stained teeth. “ Send me back, I don’t care. Fuck, sure. I know exactly what will happen to me, and I don’t care. I’ve gotten out once, chances are they’ll slip again and I’ll get out again!” They jerked their head back slightly, and spit forward a mix of blood and saliva onto the pale grey pants.  
“Also hard to tempt someone with freedom, when it’s clear as of right now chances are I’ll never see the light of day!” They spat.

“Why you little-” One of the Khan’s jerked forward to lash out at them, grabbing a fist full of hair and pulling their head up. Benny was about to retort with a response of his own at their words, when the courier’s words struck an idea with him. A cocky look danced across his face. He huffed out a small laugh, and began pacing back and forth like a predator circling its prey. He turned to the other Khan, and ordered him to grab the bag the courier had on them when they grabbed them. Once the large bag was in his hands, he turned to stare at the courier, whose eyes were starting to water from the pain of their hair being pulled.  
“Now, Guntor, babe, Refresh my memory, and tell these fine men here…” He rolled his hand, gesturing to the two others, “How exactly it was you managed to escape.” 

Guntor stared down Benny with suspicion heavy in their eyes. They were quiet for a moment, before deciding to play along.  
“Well, as you know, I am the best damn sniper this side of the dam. One of those profligates” The word, heavy in a mocking accent of the Legionaries, “Slipped up, left an absolute beauty of a gun laying around from some raid. Leaving some details out to keep this short, grabbed it, patrols went out, the small camp was fairly empty. I think the rest isn’t that hard to figure.” Their eyes still narrowed and watering as they tried to figure what Benny was getting at. As to why, that was relevant to anything going on. 

“Ah yes, that’s the part I was looking to hear. ‘Damn best sniper.’ Now, what does one need to be a good sniper?” He asked. The confusion continued to grow on the courier’s face, as he reached into the bag pulling out the .308 mm sniper rifle they had grown attached to. A fragile thing, it was, and necessarily wouldn’t be their first choice with all the repairs they constantly had to make on it, but it was their favorite.

“What besides a keen eye and patience? Quick and trigger happy fingers.” They couldn’t help the next line to come out of their mouth. “And well, we both know I have those.” They wagged their eyebrows slightly at the innuendo. 

Benny made a face, and he was certain one of the Khan’s had snickered at that, but chose to ignore it for now. He looked down at the gun as he began to look it over, turning it in his hands, testing the weight. He lifted it and peered down the scope.

“Now, what would you say would happen to a sniper, who lost those things, hm?” 

“Well they wouldn’t be a very good sniper now would the-” Guntor cut themself off as they finally got that self satisfied smirk on the man in front of them. Their face morphed quickly into one of raw fear, even more than the threat of going back to Caesar. Eye’s blown wide, and what color they had in their face drained. “No…. No, no you fucking wouldn’t. You WOULDN’T!” They shouted, voice boarding hysteria. “You know how fucking much that means to me, Benny. You can’t”

“Then where’s the bag, pussycat? I’m running out of patience here.” He demanded, taking the clip out of the gun and pocketing it before tossing the gun to the side. As it hit the ground there was a crack noise, something breaking no doubt, but that was the least of their problems at the moment. Their fingers will be the next thing cracking.

Guntor’s breaths were coming out fast now, clearly trying to think of something. At this point they had guessed whatever was in the package must be very important for Benny to go all out for it. And they had known Benny long enough to know that, whatever it was, he probably shouldn’t have it. They couldn’t, though, help themselves to the thought of just handing over the location of where they had hide the bag when they got word from the town they had stopped in, that Benny and his friends were coming for them. Five other courier’s before them had been similarly jumped, but let go when they didn’t have whatever it was he was looking for. They shook their head. No, they couldn’t hand it over, no matter what. But their skill at being a sniper is what gave them their worth, their edge to keep going after all they’ve been through. So yeah, bite them for wanting to hold onto that. 

They swallowed heavily, eyes darting back and forth, taking in their surroundings trying to find something to get them out of this mess, at least to give them a head start as they ran. Out of the corner of their eye, they noticed Benny waving his hand towards the one Khan not holding them up. Dread sat heavy in their stomach as they approached. 

“Come on, you have 10 seconds before we break your damn fingers, kid. Where’s. The. bag.”

Guntor almost spilled, they almost said where the bag was when they noticed the small 9 mm strapped to the Khan that was holding them’s belt. Too weak to do any real damage, but not much choice at this point. They were only paying half attention to Benny as he sighed and told to Khan to get on with it, as they quickly formed a rather half assed plan in their head. 

The Khan took only one step, before the courier got their footing on the ground, just enough to straighten up and send their head straight into the Khan holding them’s nose. There was a sickening crack and the hold on their hair had let go, dropping them. Quick on their feet, they turned around, grabbing the gun from the belt in their bound hands, whirling around with a cock, and firing it a few times aimlessly at Benny and the other Khan.They could hear one hit the ground dodging and another sound of a groan in pain, meaning the bullet had struck somewhere. Not wasting time to see who was up or down, they bolted. 

Running with their hands behind their back, actually proved harder than they originally thought, proving this was going to be a problem. Clearly, though, not one to focus on at the moment. They just had to keep running. Goodsprings was probably only 3 miles or so down the road, it hadn’t been long since they passed through before getting jumped. If they could make it there, they were positive at least someone could help-

The thought was cut short as a firey and blistering pain shot up their leg, and only after the incredible pain they felt was when they processed the deafening sound of a shotgun going off. Their body gave out from under them, and their leg burst into agonizing pain. They screamed out in pain, eyes quickly watering up and they dry heaved sobs. Guntor glanced over their shoulder to see Benny and a Khan, who was the one holding the shotgun and therefore the one who had shot them, racing towards them, much closer than they had thought. Clearly they hadn’t been running as fast as they had hoped. The courier only spared a quick look towards their leg which was a mess. They didn’t focus long on it, just enough to see through the jeans the torn open flesh of the back of their knee, exposing muscle and possibly a shattered bone. 

Through their tears, they began using their good leg to push them across the hard desert ground on their stomach. They refused to give up, they knew at this point they weren’t getting away, not like this. But like hell they were just going to lay there and accept their fate like that. Fuck. No. 

They had made it probably no more than 2 feet of pathetic kicking themself forward before Benny grabbed a fist full of filthy ginger hair, pulling them up making a tsking noise.

“Now now, wasn’t that an act of desperation. The threat of being unable to shoot a gun scares you more than Caesar?” He rolled his eyes, with a laugh. “I’ll never get you, Guntor.” A pause. “And now it seems I never will.” He made a small frown of indifference and let go of their hair, dropping them face first into the dirt. “Why’d you have to run, eh? Breaking my heart over here.”

Guntor sobbed heavily in pain into the ground, sure that their face was a mess now with sand and small pebbles sticking to it.  
“FUCK YOU.” They screeched out, between body writhing sobs. Benny pinched the bridge of his nose with a sigh. 

“Where’s the package, Guntor. I have asked enough at this point. I’m going to break your fingers right now regardless of whether you tell me.” The only reply he got was another ‘fuck you’ and some creative jabs at his sexual preferences, which he found surprising coming from the state the courier was currently in. He gave a shrug before bending down. “You asked for it.” He reached out and grabbed one of the bound hands and used his other to gesture the Khan forward to hand them something. Guntor missed what was passed into Benny’s hands, but didn’t have much time to put much thought into it before there was a crushing crack and pain blossomed in two fingers of their trigger hand.

Normally at night, the Mojave wasn’t all that quiet apart, the occasional screech of some creature or gunfire, but tonight, the scream that came from the courier’s mouth was so loud, Benny was willing to bet they could hear it all the way on the Strip. Let House sit on that, trying to pass over him with trying to sneak this package without his knowing. 

He sat back, and could hear the other Khan member finally coming, cursing about a broken nose, but paid it no mind as he looked at the crushed fingers on the courier. He opened the heavy duty pillars, and went to put them on their thumb when the courier cried out to stop. 

“The b-bag, the fu, fucking bag! A fucking, water plant. Outside Goodsprings.” They wailed. “There’s a water plant, water hole, fuck I don’t know. The bag’s shoved into a whole in a well. The package is there. Fuck no, no more. I can’t.” 

A pleased look passed over Benny’s face, and he stood up and spread his arms with a smile.  
“Now, that wasn’t so hard, was it? Why didn’t you just say so!” He snapped and flicked his wrist towards Guntor. “See how much easier things are when you just answer the questions asked to you?” The courier didn’t answer, rather still blubbering on the ground in pain. He pulled a face and gave an indifferent shrug, he leaned down and closed the pillars onto the thumb, resulting in another scream and howl of pain.  
“Knock ‘em out.” 

The last thing Guntor processed, was a figure standing above them and something hitting them in the back of the head before it all went dark.

 

 

Dropped to the ground and a swift kick to the head followed by a muffled ‘time to get up’ is what brought them back to consciousness. A blistering wave of pain washed over them from all over. They could no longer feel their leg which was not a good sign, but hell like any of this was. They could feel something both crusty and wet on the back of their head, and was willing to bet it was a mix of drying and still bleeding blood from whatever they had been hit with to knock them out. 

“You got what you were after, now pay up.” A voice spoke above them. They forced their eyes open, squinting at the three shapes above them. They could see that one of the Khan’s were currently digging a hole to the side of Benny who was staring off into the distance, a cigarette in between his fingers. They exchanged a few words, that Guntor couldn’t bring themself to fully listen to or understand at the moment. They tried to get their breathing under control as the pain throbbed all over.

“Guess who’s wakin’ up ova’ here.” That caught their attention though, and now the attention was on them. Benny glanced at Guntor before turned to face the Khan and dropped the cigarette, crushing it under his shoe into the dirt. 

“Time to cash out.” He said as he approached the courier on the ground, who squirmed as they tried to wiggle away from him.

“Would you get it over with?” The other Khan spoke up behind him. With that, a look of annoyance passed over Benny’s face. He closed his eyes and inhaled, as he held up a finger to silence the Khan. 

“Maybe Khan’s kill people without lookin’ them in the face.” He brought his hand down. “But I ain’t a fink, dig?” He turned his head slightly to the Khan on the right of him. He shook his head and slowly brought his hand up and slipped it under that hideous checkered coat. He fished around for something before pulling out a small, poker chip made out of what looked like platinum. Guntor was quick to figure that that was probably what the package was. All this? Over some fucking chip?

“You made your last delivery, kid.” He said, depositing the chip back inside his coat, though not removing his hand. “Sorry, you got twisted up in this scene.” After all that he had done to them, he had the nerve to sound actually sympathetic. Guntor began to heave heavily in anger, they bared their teeth and clenched their fists to the point where it burst into agonizing pain, forgetting for just a moment that their fingers were broken. 

In the midst of their pain, they missed Benny pulling out his pistol from his inner coat pocket somewhere. He made a face at their groaning scream of pain, and almost winced. Sure, before they would of been described as friends and somewhere deep down he’d probably regret doing this to them sooner or later, but right now the importance was the chip and what it meant. 

“From where you are, must seem like an 18-karat run of bad luck.” He turned the pistol over, looking down at it before sighing and aiming it straight at the center of their head. 

 

 

“The truth is ……. Game was rigged from the start.”

 

 

Bang.

 

 

 

 

 

“Not many survive a shot like that, let alone come out as competent as you seem to be currently, so forgetting who you are is probably one of the better things to lose in this scenario. So, what should I call you?” 

_Five other courier’s before them…._

“.... Call me …. Six….”


End file.
